Stocks End Slightly Lower, Tesla Jumps Over 5%
10:06 am Thursday, June 24th, 2021
U.S. stocks traded in a narrow range Wednesday, holding onto gains from earlier in the week as the S&P hovered just shy of its all-time high.
The major indices have traded in a narrow range, with volume a little bit on the lighter side at the NYSE. The energy (+0.5%) and consumer discretionary (+0.4%) sectors were some of today’s leaders, keying off higher oil prices and a nice gain in Tesla (TSLA), respectively.
Other supportive factors have included a well-behaved Treasury market and a comment from Fed Chair Powell yesterday that the Fed isn’t going to raise rates preemptively in response to fears of inflation. The 10-yr yield is currently up one basis point to 1.49%.
The market, however, has been restrained by relative weakness in the utilities (-0.9%), health care (-0.4%), consumer staples (-0.3%), and information technology (-0.1%) sectors, as well as losses in Apple (AAPL), Microsoft (MSFT), and Amazon.com (AMZN).
Another headwind in today’s session was the weaker than-expected new home sales report for May, which declined 5.9% m/m to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 769,000 (Briefing.com consensus 873,000).
Microsoft traded lower despite having its price target raised to a Street-high $325 from $310 at Wedbush. Separately, United Rentals (URI), Parker-Hannifin (PH), and Huntington Banc (HBAN) were up more than 2.0% following some positive-minded analyst recommendations.
New home sales declined 5.9% month-over-month in May to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 769,000 (consensus 873,000) from a downwardly revised 817,000 (from 975,000) in April. On a yr/yr basis, new home sales were up 9.2%.
U.S. Treasuries ended Wednesday on a lower note with shorter tenors pacing the retreat after showing relative strength yesterday. The trading day started on a quiet note after a largely uneventful overnight session. The 2-yr note underperformed from the start and remained behind throughout the day while longer tenors inched higher at the open but surrendered their slight gains in short order.
